It's true! The "typical American diet" kills WAY more people than any kind of terrorism does, yet the news coverage is so skewed to ignore one and inflate the other. I do think that the fact that fast food chains spend gazillions of dollars advertising on cable news has something to do with that fact -- kudos to CNN for giving a bit of airspace to a huge (and hugely underestimated) problem.

I was able to watch it, and it was excellent. Much of it was "recycled" from other studies/articles/books I've read, but it was most interesting, especially about the lack of stores selling produce in some areas of Chicago!

Rant warning.
Phantastica, ALL disadvantaged neighborhoods are boycotted by grocery chains. They all abound in liquor stores, and stop-&-robs where milk is 50% more than what a supermarket charges, so is bread, and the only vegetable you can find is in a corn chip. Oops, corn is a grain, not a vegetable. So I guess that leaves NO vegetables. The first time I ever became aware of it was when I commuted on a bus that went through west Oakland, CA. I have since paid attention to the phenomenon. And poor people often have no car, and have you ever tried to carry 8 bags of groceries on a bus through a bad neighborhood? Not recommended.

Of course terrorism is bigger news than diet. Follow the money, always. Terrorism makes scads of it for all kinds of people. If we eat less, nobody makes more money. Agribusiness does not want us to make smarter choices. Neither do the junkfood megacorps. Or anybody who bulks up their products with nutritionally useless and possibly harmful, but dead cheap, ingredients. Ever notice that when something like sugar is left OUT, they charge more? Even though it's cheaper to make? Compare peanut butters some time. It's all about exploiting the discriminating consumer to get the last dollar.

I thought soy was always good for you, until I watched the CNN show. Salmon, here I come! Gotta balance out those Omega Sixes with Omega Threes. Or was it the other way around? That was the only really new-to-me piece of info. Fascinating program anyway. The urban gardeners may start a food revolution. I hope so!

__________________Shellie

"Time and trouble will tame an advanced young woman, but an advanced old woman is uncontrollable by any earthly force." --Dorothy L. Sayers

I thought soy was always good for you, until I watched the CNN show. Salmon, here I come! Gotta balance out those Omega Sixes with Omega Threes. Or was it the other way around? That was the only really new-to-me piece of info.

I think if you look at how insidiously soybean OILS (partially hydrogenated or not) are permeating every packaged food product it is very telling. The real problem occurs when people eat a diet high in processed, packaged foods and oils.

Rant warning.
Phantastica, ALL disadvantaged neighborhoods are boycotted by grocery chains. They all abound in liquor stores, and stop-&-robs where milk is 50% more than what a supermarket charges, so is bread, and the only vegetable you can find is in a corn chip. Oops, corn is a grain, not a vegetable. So I guess that leaves NO vegetables. The first time I ever became aware of it was when I commuted on a bus that went through west Oakland, CA. I have since paid attention to the phenomenon. And poor people often have no car, and have you ever tried to carry 8 bags of groceries on a bus through a bad neighborhood? Not recommended.

Of course terrorism is bigger news than diet. Follow the money, always. Terrorism makes scads of it for all kinds of people. If we eat less, nobody makes more money. Agribusiness does not want us to make smarter choices. Neither do the junkfood megacorps. Or anybody who bulks up their products with nutritionally useless and possibly harmful, but dead cheap, ingredients. Ever notice that when something like sugar is left OUT, they charge more? Even though it's cheaper to make? Compare peanut butters some time. It's all about exploiting the discriminating consumer to get the last dollar.

I thought soy was always good for you, until I watched the CNN show. Salmon, here I come! Gotta balance out those Omega Sixes with Omega Threes. Or was it the other way around? That was the only really new-to-me piece of info. Fascinating program anyway. The urban gardeners may start a food revolution. I hope so!

The disadvantaged part was the most striking to me too. ****, grocery shopping in a city is a pain if you middle or working class in general- not just in bad areas. Where I lived over the summer was a half mile away (which isn't far until you're carrying a few bags of groceries) from the nearest grocery store- and even that was teeny and often the produce seemed like it was several weeks past date. The only other option was to walk a half mile+ further and go to a Whole Foods or a similar community grocery store which both are much too expensive for a poor, interning for free college student. I was lucky- I had friends who lives nearby me but were even further from the grocery stores. When you have to walk that far with your groceries, you have to make choices about what you buy. Fruits and vegetables are bulky and easily smush and bruise. It's easier to buy a bunch of easy mac or canned foods.

At least there are options but veggies in cities are so incredibly expensive. The Whole Foods in my suburban community at home is MUCH MUCH cheaper. Even in areas where they are available, they are hard to afford. Cheap canned or boxed foods always stay cheap, no matter where you go. Even between rural-ish Georgia and Boston, Hamburger Helper and Easy Mac are the same price.

I loved the parts about the experimental research showing how we mindlessly eat!
* People eat more stale popcorn when the bag is big vs small
* People eat more chicken wings when their discards were cleaned up and they couldn't see how much they'd already consumed
* For officeworkers, compared to when candy was 6 feet away, when a candy dish was kept on their desks, they ate an average of 5 extra candies a day (for a total of 125 calories/day, which they figured came to something like 10 pounds a year!)

It really is true that just KNOWING what you're eating can help a lot!

And the other piece of info that was enlightening: If every person started eating the recommended 5 servings of fruit and veggies a day there wouldn't be enough to go around!!!

__________________

My 5 C's of healthy living: Commitment to conscious control, with the understanding that choices have consequences